Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It was all O’Neill’s fault

In most realities, Jack O’Neill was either retired or too busy in the Pentagon to come with SG-1 when the Asgard invited them to come by ship to Orilla.

In this one, he was surprisingly free and took the opportunity to relax a bit with his former teammates and ordered General Laundry to leave the ship with the others between two Ori assaults. What he did not expect was to be trapped in the Odyssey for years in some kind of time bubble he did not really understand. Sure, Carter had tried to explain to him and it was not his first rodeo with accelerated time, he could still remember giving the order to betray the Replicator Number 5 after all. But still, seeing the shot that would kill them coming closer and closer and being unable to do anything was hard to swallow.

Five years. That was the amount of time they had spent in this tin can. The six of them. He looked around the table and could see that everyone was eating in silence. Mitchell, looking towards the Ori ships through the window. Daniel and Vala, acting innocent but he was certain they were having “discussions” late into the night most days. If they were happy, he had no objections. In this situation, everyone had to find something that could stave off the craziness. Teal’c was as usual, stoic but alert. Even after years of no possible enemy, he was still alert. Jack could only respect that.

And then there was Sam, Carter, his second and now, his lover. Sure, the road to get there was long but they had finally been unable to stop themselves and had been together for just a bit longer than those five damned years. This trip to see the Asgards had also been an opportunity to spend time together. To reassure themselves that even in a work situation, they were able to stay professional. At least, they were sure now and their relationship was stronger than ever. Every time they kissed, it felt like the first time, during the time loop…

“If only we could go back in time like with that blasted device from P4X-639, with our memories and all just before we accept this trapped gift…” he said out loud without realizing and the silence became tense.

If Teal’c had been alert before, he was now tense like a bowstring. He did not like thinking about that mission at all.

Mitchell and Vala wore a curious expression as the planet did not ring any bells for them.

Daniel looked at him weirdly. Jack had no idea what he was thinking.

Sam had dropped her fork. She looked like a deer in the headlights. She rose, took his collar and kissed him with tongue and all, before turning back and leaving the room in a hurry.

“Umh, Jack, I think you have given her an idea” said a bewildered Daniel to a dopey general.

After a few moments, he came back to himself and stood up, “we better go see what she is cooking up”. And everyone stood up realizing that they may have a way out of this floating prison.

They walked quickly to the Asgard core room, not running like Sam but still going faster than usual. The corridors that usually felt so short and restraining now felt like going on and on for miles. When they finally entered the room, they were able to see her frantically reading and inputting things on the Asgard computer. The smile she progressively lost during their stay in the ship was back. The same smile she had when she destroyed a star: it was not as reassuring as Jack thought it would be.

“So, Carter, what grand idea did you come up with from my little slip up?” he asked, knowing that it probably related to some kind of time travel. He did not know what to think, after all his experience with time travel had really stuck in his mind as a dangerous endeavor and reverted to calling her by her surname.

“J-my general, I-um” she looked at her teammates and took a deep breath before fully focusing on them “I remembered what I read when I studied the time bubble physics. At that time I didn't really care about this simple sentence, that the time bubble was developed from an early attempt of the Ancients to time travel. The Asgard were able to decrypt it from the few percents of a repository that they had found and from what I've just read, they did some experiment on the original on P4X-639! Sure, they also were unable to make it work for more than one or two minutes into the past without causing a loop but that is all we need, one minute and this crystal I've already programmed to disable the core in a few seconds! I had already done that as I thought whatever solution we would find, we would need to remove the Ori’s ability to track us and-”

“Carter” he tried to say before catching her by the shoulders, he looked at her in the eyes, “Sam, you are starting to ramble. What you are trying to say is that we could go back in time to a minute before we started the time bubble with our memories intact? Wouldn't we need a gate and a coronal mass ejection?”

“No, that was in order to rewind an enormous amount of space-time, tens of light-years across. According to what I've just read, I just have to make some modifications and ‘tag’ us like the machine did so that we keep our memories. We may be a bit short on energy though…” she frowned.

“Well” started Mitchell, looking through the window again “if we need energy, I know just the place”

“We may as well take advantage of what they are offering us” she grinned. And for the first time in a couple of years, everyone seemed to find hope again.

In the corner of the room, an invisible being ‘smiled’ too. Well, as much as an Ascended was still able to without having taken physical form. He was not an important one in the Others hierarchy, having been raised by Oma Desala when Anubis destroyed his planet. But Skaara could not leave his friend and his brother-in-law alone, even if he was unable to help them. Most of the time, he could feel the presence of other Ascended beings nearby, checking that he was not breaking the rules of non-interference. But this time he was alone in the time bubble and nobody could stop him from making some changes to the program Carter would be doing.

He may not have been from an advanced race in his mortal life, however he had learned a lot about the technology of the Ancient once he ascended. And strangely enough, a weird Lantean was often talking to him about his "time travelling gate ship" so he knew what he had to do. After a few days of thinking and a lot of hidden code added to the program she was writing, he realized that he could come with them too. Even if someone up here realized what he had done, they would be unable to do anything because of their own rules as he would have technically given up on his powers.

He also had to think of a good moment in time where to send them. Vala needed to be free of her Demon, that was unavoidable: a goa’uld with knowledge of the future would be a disaster. That limited the lower date by quite a lot as she was freed from Qetesh after Ra’s death. The Tok’ra had wanted to know what had happened to him and she was one of the last who had seen him.

That would mean that they would not be able to save O’Neill’s son…

He thought and pondered and argued with himself. The point was to save as many people as possible and at the same time, all of them had to be able to still save the day (or survive in Vala’s case) without future knowledge potentially making it worse. The upper limit was the day Sha’re died. He had to save his older sister after all and he knew she wouldn't begrudge Daniel for having found love again after her death when they would tell her the truth. Polygamy was not a problem for their culture either, having so many men dying in the mines or being taken by Ra to work on dangerous planets, their culture had to adapt to the number of men vs the number of women. Vala would not mind either, he had ‘seen’ her past, she would have fun he was certain of that.

The more he calculated the possibilities, the more he realized that it would have to be during the year and a half Daniel spent on Abydos, even though it would be harder for Teal’c, he was sure the Jaffa could handle it.

Daniel was ready. He had touched the crystal like everyone else in order to remember their years here and not make the same mistakes. At first Sam volunteered to be the only one to remember, as she was needed for the disabling of the Asgard core but they all disagreed. They were a team after all and they would not really lose anything by coming too.

Except maybe some sanity, what was he thinking when he accepted that he had been in love with Vala for years .

He focused back to the present and asked “Sam? What about the program which will turn off the core? I mean only our memories will travel after all.”

“I thought about that, don't worry. There will be a force field around it and it will not be affected by time displacement. I will have it available as soon as we arrive” she went back to her console and with a nod from Jack, pushed the last command.

At the same time, Daniel was preparing himself mentally again, next to Vala who was humming some Disney songs. He took a breath and her hand before looking into her eyes as he felt the buzz from the Ori weapon and felt the world becoming orange from the fire and the explosion. Before it consumed him, he saw a bright white light and the world righted itself into…
...

Light

Heat

Sunlight

Daniel could smell the dry air, the desert and some animal. He could feel a familiar sensation under his feet: sand. He opened his eyes and immediately realized that he was walking towards the pyramid on Abydos...

Chapter Text

Daniel was on Abydos.

A planet destroyed by a mistake he was not allowed to remember entirely.

A planet where his life changed.

A planet he could not face after so many mistakes.

And he was there, under its sun, smelling its familiar fragrance and feeling its sand for the first time in years. He-

“Daniel” interrupted someone behind him, the sound of his young but masculine voice very familiar. “I’m so happy to see you again!” a younger than expected Skaara hugged him.

“Skaara? Wh-What happened? Did we all die and you are taking me to Ascend?”

“No Daniel, this is real! We are back on Abydos!” He let go of his brother-in-law and exclaimed with more joy than he had ever felt these last few years. Ascension may be the goal of life according to some old Others but it felt bland compared to being home again.

“What do you mean?” said Daniel starting to panic, “What do you mean by back?”

Skaara took a breath and the air around him changed subtly, from the young man Daniel always remembered him as to a wiser and weathered person.

“I’m sorry Daniel, I couldn’t leave you or Jack alone after I left. I often followed when you were on a mission even though some Others were stopping me from interfering, I wanted to be there.” He paused and amidst the confusion, Daniel realized that his accent was perfect, something that was not the case before his death/Ascension. “I was there on the ship when you were trapped in the time bubble and for once, no one else was with me… I had to take this chance! I had to do it to save everyone here and billions of souls in this galaxy!”

Daniel did not know what to say to this but he clamped his hand on the boy, nay the man, in front of him before taking him back to the hug. After a few more seconds, he said:

“I understand… I don’t know what to say… I don’t even know what I’m feeling or what I’m supposed to feel but I understand that you wanted to save everyone, even us…” He let go and took a deep breath, “let’s go inside, it is starting to get too hot out here”

They walked in silence, both trapped in their mind. Skaara wondering if he hurt his brother but knowing that he made the right decision and Daniel feeling that his world was breaking but unable to blame his little brother. Suddenly he realized that only now was he worrying about his teammates.

“Where is everyone else? And when are we?” he asked.

“Well, I had to choose the perfect moment in time, one when no one was doing anything dangerous like driving those blasted cars your countrymen love so much. By the way, you need to teach me how to tame one, even knowing how dangerous they are I want to try!” He grinned and Daniel nodded with a small but genuine smile. “Sure, I’ll teach you”.

“Anyway, I also had to find some time after Vala’s possession and before Sha’re kidnapping, so that you can have your two wives” He said, trying to stay serious.

“My wi-”

“So” He cut forcefully, “We are a few months before the coming of Apophis, Vala just got free from Qetesh, Teal’c is on Chulak with his family, the others are on Earth sleeping as it is the night in the US right now.”

“Wait a second, we will go back to that later. What do you mean by two wives?!” He exclaimed, his breath quickening.

“Daniel, brother, I know you will not leave any of them now that you are back. Sure, it will surprise Sha’re but we will have to tell her the truth. She’ll understand”

Daniel went silent, realizing that, in a way, maybe even in all ways, Skaara was right. They continued to walk a few minutes before arriving at the pyramid.

“Why were we going there again?” He asked.

“I remember choosing this day in particular because we were going to the room where the tablet about the lost city was found. The first time we didn't find it obviously but now I know how to open the secret chamber!” He replied happily.

“Atlantis? Already?”

“We have to change history. A lot of your successes came down to chance, we have to destroy the Goa’uld as quickly as possible and Atlantis is a good possibility, don’t you think?”

“There is the problem of the Wraiths, we can’t handle them at the same time as the Goa’uld so early in our program”

“And how can we do that? I guess if we had ZPM we could move the city to the Milky Way. Though we would have to find them” Daniel said dejectedly.

“Don’t worry about that, if we have the access code, we can get to the Molecular Factory. And guess who packaged his memories nicely so as not to forget these kinds of things?” he answered with a tilt.

“I guess this time you will be carrying us to victory” he said proudly, “and this molecular factory can make ZPM?”

“Well I know a lot about your later adventures but I'm not up to date with the rest even if the other fans told me some of them. And a Molecular Factory is similar to what you used to build Merlin’s machine but bigger and fully automated.”

“Wait wait wait” once again surprised, Daniel could not stop himself from going back to his former answer, “what do you mean by fans?”

“Daniel, did you really think I was the only one watching? Some started stalki- I mean, watching you when you had your theories about the pyramids. Ganos even told me that she was sad not having been able to get a lot closer to you during your time up there” he said winking as they entered the pyramid.

Daniel felt the hair on the back of his neck rise for a moment, thinking about all those people potentially watching him all the time before realizing that he could not do anything about it anyway.

—

Jack awoke with a gasp: he did not remember falling asleep. What was he doing before? He was… on the Odyssey and they were going back in time! He looked around himself and could recognize his old room, in the house he bought after coming back from Abydos, in Colorado Springs. He should have expected it, time travel always went bad…

He spent some time looking at the ceiling, wondering what he would do when he heard the phone ring.

Before he could say anything, he heard:

“Jack!” said the familiar voice of Samantha.

“Sam… I guess you are about to tell me that you overshot?”

“It was not supposed to happen, my general.”

He sighed and asked “Do you have an idea on how to fix this?”

“My general, Jack, only our memories went back, and the Asgard cristal with the stop program I guess must be in the middle of space. Or maybe it-" "Carter” “Sorry, what I meant is that we can’t come back.”

Jack had already guessed that but now he knew that it was really the case. At least, his knees did not hurt anymore.

“Let’s go to Vegas, Sam. And call Cameron, we need a witness.”